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The location of proposed new hangers at the Baldwin County Regional Airport has created a controversy with nearby residents that could delay a vote on an important matter concerning the facility.
Baldwin County Manager Carlos Tobar said last week that an annual update on the Capital Improvements Projects (CIP) for the airport is on the agenda for the Board of Commissioners meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 3. The east apron project calling for the construction of two large hangers directly across from a residential subdivision on Lakeshore Circle is part of that five-year plan.
When most of the trees in that area were cut as part of the site work, effectively removing what buffer was there, protests erupted. District 4 County Commissioner Henry Craig called for a halt in the removal of the trees, but relatively few remain.
Neighborhood residents attended a called meeting on Sept. 15, and 10 spoke out in opposition to the proposed location for the hangers, in a phone interview this past Monday, Craig stated the status of the project is “unchanged” at this point.
Tobar said the endeavor was approved last year as part of the county’s fiscal year 2023 program and the county is prepared to move forward with the adoption of the updated plan.
Craig is aware the CIP program is on a schedule to be addressed.
“I know it’s on the agenda. I don’t know what the vote will be or whether it will stay on the agenda,” he said.
Craig explained the vote does not necessarily have to happen this week, but relatively soon. He could not offer any suggestion of what commissioners may do.
“I’m still putting some information together,” he said, “And it’s in my district. My house is near the airport also. These are my neighbors, and I am listening to them very carefully. At the same time, I’m looking at the whole county and other legal and economic issues also.”
The east apron project will be discussed on Tuesday, with or without the CIP vote, unless someone directs otherwise. Tobar said Monday that landscape architect Will Wise will be at the meeting on behalf of the engineering firm.
“I am hoping he has a conceptual plan for east apron landscaping,” Tobar said.
Meanwhile, another CIP project has created discussion as well. Tobar said the terminal apron expansion design was on the list last year, and construction could begin this fiscal year.
“The terminal apron is to increase the airplane parking area near the terminal,” Tobar said. “We secured competitive funding of $2.3 million for it.”
Tobar also explained other airports have encountered problems that led to delays in projects. Those delays could possibly mean more money for Baldwin County, he said.
“They’ve got to assign those funds to someone else. So, we may actually get more than $2.3 million on this. It’s going to cost more than that.”
Craig said the terminal apron project may require more preliminary matters to be addressed. He also suggested a meeting on the terminal parking expansion last week resulted in some misconceptions.
“There were some issues brought up there, and actually it went places it should not have gone. The emotions take over, and the imagination takes over,” Craig said. “That specific project is for a specific place, which is right around the terminal. All of a sudden, it involved projects east of the terminal, which were not involved, and it was difficult to make people understand that the project was for a very specific area of the airport. The grant money is for that and can’t be used elsewhere.”
When informed of Tobar’s comments concerning additional funds possibly becoming available for the terminal area project, Craig was cautious in response.
“These are complicated decisions for the county also,” he said. “There is always matching money involved in these projects, and some of them can be significantly very large. The commissioners have the discretion in the five-year plan to adjust the plan, if necessary, based on resources that may or may not be available.”